


The Ghosts Have All Gone Home

by smokesprite



Series: Like I was Never There [2]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, M/M, bless renee tho shes still stuck in a mirror, everyone is still trapped in weird palces but theyre starting not to be
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-06-19 02:35:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15500427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smokesprite/pseuds/smokesprite
Summary: Sequel to "Like I was Never There"The old ones, the ones with no name, are escaping their tombs one by one. And while both Neil and Kevin feel a new chance at life, their past hasn't forgotten them.





	1. Prologue

And someday when the ghosts have all gone home,  
far too late to be rattling bones, then will you lay me down,  
lay me down? Oh, will you let it be?

-Seven deadly sins, Natalie Merchant

 

Neil had always wanted to be a witch, like his mother.

He would watch her across a large oak library table, and imitate her as best he could.

“No, not like that. Grind the herbs widdershins,” she would say, and he would hasten to correct himself.

His mother was not a woman to be fooled, never allowed herself to be taken in by the ritual, but every time Neil’s spells failed he felt the disappointment anew.

He was like his father, he knew that. He’d always known that. He would be continually learning that for the rest of his life, no matter how much Neil resented it.

Still.

In the past few weeks he had felt closer to his mother—and farther from his father, farther from the nothing he had become in recent millennia—then he had since the lessons at that old oak table.

When Neil tells all this to Andrew, Andrew wants to hate him.

But the truth is that Neil is beginning to feel like a home, too.

 

XXX

 

Time and darkness did not speak, and Kevin always seemed to be caught in the silence between the two.

It was why when the light appeared—when the door was opened and the world returned to him—he didn’t think about running towards it. Be it dream or memory, he just _did_.

When the darkness followed, and something stronger than luck guided a mortal child’s fist, it was why Kevin held tight to that mortal and knew he could not let go.

His existence was a life again. There was light, there was sound, there was magic—the good kind, the kind that did not make him cold to the bone.

But all those millennia in darkness, and time felt it was owed. It was why when Andrew and Neil were off trading secrets, and Aaron was off dancing, and Nicky was off in a faraway city, and his father was off aging, and Jean and Thea and Jeremy and Riko were off who knew where—

It was why, in those moments, time tucked him in its pocket.

It stroked his cheeks and pulled at his hair until everything moved around him in a blur. The noise pushed at his ears, forcing its way in, filling a void Kevin hadn’t known needed to be filled. Time forced its way into his chest and made his heart beat and whispered to him, _I will take of you what I can before you leave me again._

 

XXX

 

Two strange girls haunted a strange, crooked castle on a strange, crooked hill.

It was already haunted, but that didn’t stop them.

Allison was a force of nature, sweeping through the halls like a wind and breathing new life into the stones.

Renee was one of those stones—and each day the image of the girl in the third floor bedroom mirror grew vibrant, more solid, until it seemed she could not possibly be a reflection.

Every time she appeared, Allison fought the urge to look over her shoulder to see if Renee really was there.

And she did not know how the magic of this old place worked, but Allison was convinced that one day, Renee would be.

 

XXX

 

Jean had a name.

Jean had a language.

It did not matter how many times Riko reached inside his chest, these things lived in a place deeper than Jean’s heart, and they could not be taken.


	2. Chapter 1

“Your father is gone.”

Tetsuji Moriyama spoke calmly as the mortal made to open his prison door gasped her last.

“How do you know?”

Riko Moriyama spoke with stillness, not calm, as red hot blood pooled around their feet.

Tetsuji motioned vaguely towards the sky. The cane in his right hand was cracked, and Jean involuntarily flinched. He’d thought it was going to hit him. He remembered that cane.

“The crows are shouting his name.”

 

XXX

 

Jean regretted leaving the valley.

The world had been small, just a village of men and the Old Ones who ruled but rarely showed themselves. He missed the grass and the river and he missed it small. And now that he wanted nothing more than to retreat to that village, there was nothing left of it.

_What a mistake._

_What a fool._

_Breathe._

Jean’s eyes fixed on the man three feet in front of him.

Riko wasn’t looking at Jean, but that didn’t mean it was safe to stare. Even after centuries with the Old One, Jean wasn’t sure what Riko knew. Would the winds tell him if Jean looked too long? Surely, Riko did not know as much as his uncle and brother. Surely, not as much as his father.

But, enough.

Riko knew enough.

As if he were reading Jean’s mind, Riko turned around. “What do you say, Jean? Care for some dinner?”

Jean did not look at the travelers in front of them. Did not listen to the sound of their fear, or the sound of their flesh, or the sound of the fire crackling. He killed them quick and cooked them through and scavenged through their things as neatly as he could.

He imagined the music the water made as it ran over rocks in the stream near the edge of the village.

He found a pair of shoes that fit him well. He found a book that ended too soon. He found a tin of buttons.

The moon rose and the moon set. The sun followed, but brought only light. After the first few sunrises, once he’d run from the smothering darkness and almost escaped, Jean had stopped expecting more.

Riko said when the meat sizzled one night, it told him all of its secrets.

It spoke of four strange men.

Jean ate, and he nodded when Riko talked, and when Riko told him to toss the leftovers outside of camp he did so, and when they lay down he did not dream.

 

XXX

 

The sun cooked Jean the way Jean cooked mortals, and only his shadow was safe. He’d have turned around and asked its secrets, but Jean never made eye contact with his own shadow. Couldn’t stand the bastard.

He said as much to a farmhand outside of Riverfall and she laughed nervously.

It might’ve been agreement, but it could be that he was just strange.

He couldn’t remember a time when he had not been strange. In the village, he had watched the Old Ones when others cast their eyes down, and once he’d been claimed by Riko he no longer had a desire to look.

Besides. He was not strange. _Strange_ was knowing which fork in the road would lead to a copse of mulberry trees, _strange_ was calling the rain in instead of crying, _strange_ was working the forgotten magic in the world. Jean was just broken.

They were on the trail of something, Jean could tell by the way Riko’s face grew sharp when he studied the horizon. But only intermittently did Jean remember the four _strange_ men Riko had spoken of, and he only thought of Kevin when Riko pulled out his knives, and told Jean to kneel.

 

XXX

 

The door had been opened, but Riko returned to his old prison often. It was just a door set into a hillside, by now, but Riko returned all the same. He couldn’t leave his pets—the others were still strung up in the darkness like withered fruits--and he couldn’t leave the place that had been his castle. Jean remembered by conjuring images in every corner his head; Riko remembered by dragging his fingertips over the hillside until he found the edges of stones.

A crow called.

  
"Kevin," Riko whispered.

That night, Jean was sure it rained.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey again. Well, this ended up a little rambly but Jean's not exactly 'with it'. Things will start to get clearer as events actually happen. Thanks for sticking with me!


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